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With Election Day only four days off, the Justice Department is planning to send 780 observers to polls in 23 states including Texas, California and New York.

DOJ lawyers and other employees will monitor voting in Harris, Fort Bend, Dallas and Jefferson Counties in Texas; Alameda and Riverside Counties in California; and Orange County in New York.

The Justice Department observers will join a growing throng of lawyers and poll watchers sent by the presidential candidates as well as state and local candidates. In addition, Houston-based True the Vote, self-proclaimed poll integrity organization, has pledged to deploy a virtual army of watchers to sniff out alleged voter fraud at polling stations in Texas and elsewhere across the nation.

DOJ regularly sends Election Day observers to guarantee ballot access under the Civil Rights Act of 1965. On Tuesday, they’ll be on the lookout for whether voters are subjected to different voting qualifications or procedures based on race or speaking a language other than English. Some of the observers will be able to converse with voters who primarily speak Spanish, or Asian or Native American languages. Others will check that those who are blind or otherwise disabled get the assistance they need.

Several states including Texas had voter ID laws struck down in federal courts. But confusion remains. Pennsylvania, for instance, also has a voter ID law on the books that civil rights advocates and lawyers fought in court as discriminatory against minorities. A judge ruled that poll workers can still ask for ID but must let those without them vote anyway.

Some analysts are predicting that with so many partisan and non-partisan lawyers jamming into polling places, particularly in battleground states, the chances of a close finish winding up in court are greater than ever.

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Capitol Confidential gathers the best coverage of New York politics and puts it all together. Each section - Capitol, The State Worker, New York on the Potomac, and Voices - represents a unique facet of the political scene. The Capitol section features coverage from the Times Union Capitol bureau. The State Worker is dedicated to state worker issues. New York on the Potomac offers news of interest to New Yorkers from Washington. And Voices features the best of everything else, pointing you to columnists and bloggers from across the Web.